Much of the loss was caused by the failure of a big West Virginia bank.

While the FDIC still has plenty of money to cover losses to depositors, the failures bolster recent warnings by regulators that some banks may need to tighten their lending standards.

U.S. Comptroller of the Currency John D. Hawke, who oversees nationally chartered banks, told a bankers' group Monday that regulators see some signs of risk spreading in the banking industry despite high earnings and hefty assets.

Last month, the Federal Reserve warned banks and directed its examiners to watch for signs that risky bank loans are piling up.

And on Tuesday, the Fed, the FDIC and two other bank regulatory agencies told banks and thrifts they would come under closer scrutiny by examiners if they made too many risky home-equity loans that let consumers borrow more than their home's value.

The new type of loans, known as high loan-to-value residential loans, have become increasingly popular in recent years.

Bank, thrifts and consumer finance companies have been in a heated competition for the new loans, which are marketed primarily as a way for consumers to consolidate their debts. The loans break the rules of traditional financing by letting homeowners borrow as much as 125 percent of their home's value.

In some cases, examiners may ask banks or thrifts to sell their high loan-to-value loans or to raise more capital, the regulators said.

The FDIC estimates that so far this year, five bank failures will cost the insurance fund $760 million.

''You'd have to go back to the early 1990s to find a time the insurance fund has taken this kind of a hit in any one year,'' FDIC spokesman David Barr said Tuesday.

Through most of the decade, there have been fewer than 10 bank failures a year. But in 1992, at the height of the banking crisis, 122 banks failed mostly in Texas and New England as their oil and real estate booms, respectively, collapsed.

The banking debacle was not nearly as severe, however, as the savings and loan crisis of the same period, in which lax lending policies eventually forced a government bailout of hundreds of billions of dollars.

Then as now, the bank insurance fund, which backs each account up to $100,000, has an adequate cushion to cover depositors' losses. The fund currently has $29.8 billion.

A big portion of this year's losses estimated to be up to $750 million stems from the failure of First National Bank of Keystone, a large bank based in Keystone, W.Va.

Federal regulators, who closed the bank last month, said they found ''evidence of apparent fraud that resulted in the depletion'' of its capital. They alleged, for example, that $515 million in loans fraudulently remained on the bank's books after they had been sold.

The FDIC now controls the bank's assets. Several lawsuits, some by other banks, have been filed in federal court making claims on Keystone assets.